What amber is, how this sunstone is mined - these are important issues, and even of national importance. Especially for some countries that supply sunstone, where amber mining is regulated by law. The interest of high level explained by the profitability of the industry. This is not only in the jewelry sphere, the mineral has valuable medical and technical properties.
People have been mining gems since ancient times. And for a very long time the fishery was spontaneous. This continued until the 18th century, when the Teutonic Order introduced monopoly rights to the search and processing of the gem. This is how the basics of amber production were born, which, although carried out in various parts light, concentrated in the Baltic region.
Types of amber deposits
There are many places in the world where amber is mined. Almost all of them have been little studied, except Primorsky - this is the largest amber deposit in Russia. The nature of the origin of many amber-bearing areas is still unclear. Mineralogists divide them into primary (formed in a once forested area) and secondary (placers).
Among the primary ones today we can name Fushunskoye in China, areas on Far East and the development of amber in Alaska (USA), Canada, and Austria. Large pieces of mineral have never been found here, so this type of mining site has no industrial importance.
Placers (secondary deposits) are distinguished by the fact that they are remote, and sometimes significantly from the area of their initial occurrence. After all, the mineral is unique for its density (more than 1.0) and buoyancy in water. Therefore, there are clusters of gemstones on the rivers of Alaska, at the foot of the relief in Germany, Russia, and on the Dnieper.
The largest placer of the mineral is the deposit from the Baltic to the Curonian Spit, which is located 4-15 m below sea level; the concentration of amber here is 0.2 kg/m2. During storm events, secondary deposits are washed away, and the raging Baltic Sea throws sea amber onto the shores. For example, in Latvia this type of gem production is the basis of the amber industry.
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Gem reserves that lie deep underground are also considered secondary. This phenomenon is observed in Belarus, in the Gomel and Brest regions. People dig peat by hand and find sunstone. This even provoked “amber fever” among the local population with the consequences of black fishing and the illegal use of amber veins.
Modern coastal-marine placers are widespread along the shores of not only the Baltic Sea, but also other seas and oceans (Mediterranean, Black, Northern Arctic Ocean). Some of them contain the mineral "glauconite" in the sedimentary rock, which gives the amber-bearing layers a turquoise hue, from which the name "blue earth" was born.
Such amber deposits are distributed mainly in the Baltic-Dnieper province, stretching from the North Sea through Denmark, Germany, Poland, Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. And among the methods for extracting amber, the technology of washing blue earth is popular today.
The world's main gem suppliers
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Amber reserves on the planet are usually characterized by three types of gems: Baltic amber, Caribbean and cave amber. The last type is a man-made heritage made of gems, which was inherited from distant ancestors-craftsmen. Archaeological excavations, spot finds in ancient caves, decoration and accompaniment of cult burials often become a source of amber products and unique stone samples. The situation is different with the Baltic and Caribbean gems; the “geographical” names themselves speak about their origin.
Baltic amber
This stone, mainly its variety - succinite, comes from the Baltic countries. The industrial scale, which ensured the predominant share of the world reserves of the mineral (up to 90%), acquired its mining in Kaliningrad region, in Russia. Since 1947, the specialized JSC “Kaliningrad Amber Combine” has been operating here, which controls the work largest quarries, created on the basis of the oldest deposit in the world - Palmikenskoye.
The names of the Kaliningrad villages Filino, Yantarny, Sinyavino are firmly associated among experts with the homeland of the sun stone. The Russian gem of Baltic origin is recognized as the best amber jewelry raw material in terms of its size and quality.
Caribbean amber
It is often called Dominican. This stone is mined in Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Haiti. The Caribbean zone gives the world 300 kg per year. Moreover, the gem was mined mainly by manual labor.
Dominican amber has its own value; this is the only place in the world where you can find amber with unique inclusions - various reptiles (ancient frogs, lizards), which are clearly visible through the transparent texture of the mineral. The Baltic gem loses a little here: the fauna of its inclusions is insects. Also, Dominican stone comes in blue color, which is quite rare in the amber palette.
These are the main regions and their deposits. Countries less rich in the mineral can supplement the amber map. These are Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus, Italy (Sicily), USA, Germany, Japan, Canada, Romania, Poland, Myanmar.
From the net to hydromechanics: how amber is mined
From the moment ancient man I saw a noticeable golden-honey pebble under my feet, a lot of sea waters. And with them, amber placers. This is how people began to understand how to look for amber. Nets appeared in their hands, with which the gem was fished out from a tangle of algae from the depths of the sea. They were replaced by peaks and devices used to harrow the bottom. A floating gem appeared on the surface, and clever miners collected the “harvest”.
The 17th century was a progressive period in the field of gem mining. The first mines and prototypes of quarries appear. And although these methods turned out to be unprofitable, the basics of industrial production were laid, which received great development in the twentieth century. Nowadays, ways to find amber deposits have a scientific and technical basis. And the process itself is divided into several stages:
- The top layer of soil is cut off with an excavator bucket.
- The removed rock is placed in special separation machines.
- Bulk sediments are screened out.
- The remaining stones are sorted by hand, and the amber is separated from the rest.
But the most advanced method today is hydromechanical. The upper, “empty” layer of soil is dumped into the sea by a powerful hydraulic monitor, and the subsequent layer containing minerals is immersed in a pipeline and delivered to the processing plant. Next, the procedure for selecting minerals and amber is carried out as described above.
Mining a solar gem is labor-intensive. But, as the experience of eras shows, man is weak before the magic of stones and metal. The amber rush, like the gold rush, continues. And people will look for new ways to discover new amber storehouses of nature.
Amber, this sunny ornamental stone, was popular in past centuries, and today it is experiencing a surge in popularity.
Where is it mined?
Previously, it was believed that there were no large amber deposits in Belarus, at least that’s what geological exploration “canons” said. Amber should not form on lands currently within the borders of a given country. However, recently, in the eighties of the 20th century, amber “nuggets” began to be found in the vicinity of Brest, at a former peat processing factory. Both legal and “poaching” amber mining still takes place there. Sometimes prospectors come across pieces of resin up to several kilograms in size! Deposits of sunstone have also been discovered in other swampy areas.
Illegal mining of amber in Belarus Where could amber come from there, since it is formed under completely different conditions? The answer is simple - several tons of stone were once brought to the territory of modern Belarus by a glacier. This happened in the Quaternary period.
The country's industry is gradually developing more and more new sources of this ornamental stone. It is possible to find deposits “or rather, deposits” of amber of various shades - honey, lemon, even slightly reddish.
22.10.2017 - 22:40
News of Belarus. Girls' main friends are diamonds, but no beauty will refuse an exquisite amber necklace. Test mining of amber has begun in the Brest region, as reported in the “Week” program on STV.
To reach industrial scale, scientists must prove that the deposit will be profitable. Then it’s up to investors who will be ready to invest money in the extraction and, possibly, processing of solar stone, because there are no such enterprises in Belarus yet.
Gatcha-Osovskoye field – Zhabinkovsky district. It is about 30 kilometers to Ukraine, just like to Poland. People started talking about the fact that these peatlands are rich in amber, which settled here after the glacier, back in the distant 80s. We carried out more than one geological exploration. Their results were encouraging: amber, although in small quantities, still exists.
Petr Butrim, STV:
Of the 22 deposits located in the pilot area, about 15 are swampy. This makes the extraction process much more difficult. valuable breed. The depth of the amber itself is small - about 6 meters.
Only along the surface of the water, through the thickets, can you get to the deposit that is being developed right now. Its area is 3 football fields. About 345 kilograms of amber are hidden under them.
Pavel Baltsevich, geological engineer:
This is one of the most difficult deposits - the second. Because it's flooded. No earthmoving or other equipment will reach here.
And all because the work is in full swing. And at this point it’s already half done. They plan to finish it by frost. Therefore, the equipment, which was nevertheless adapted for mining in the field, is turned off only after dark.
Alexey Anisko, geological engineer:
We are now on the dredger. The pump sucks rock. It goes through a pipe to the grid. There it is sifted out and the waste rock goes into the water. And we select a large fraction of the mineral – in this case, amber.
Despite this, the very essence of the process is simple and understandable: after suction, everything larger than 4 millimeters ends up on the table. This is the size of amber that is considered commercial. We didn’t have to wait long for factions of impressive size. It’s hard not to notice them, golden in color, on the tape.
And this is already about a week's catch. Belarusian amber surprises, first of all, with a rich palette of colors - from yellow and red to white, brown and even green.
Vladimir Mayuk, geological engineer:
You can remove this blackness and what remains is a whole stone, which is without damage. That is, it can be inserted into any product.
However, it is too early to talk about this. The 22 project deposits identified on the map contain about 2.5 tons of amber. The exploration results are obvious, but about production in industrial scale for now there is no question. Getting the first, non-handicraft, experience without much damage to nature is what is really important today.
Andrey Kovkhuto, deputy general director enterprises "Belzarubezhtorg":
Amber is a new raw material for Belarus, which confirms that our subsoil is rich in minerals.
And for this, first of all, it is necessary not only to determine the extraction methods, structure and grade, but also to calculate the economic feasibility - is it profitable. By the way, Belarusian amber - the one that is now on the shelves of the museum - was recently compared with Baltic amber.
Elena Grabovskaya, leading researcher at the Brest Regional Museum of Local Lore:
Samples of our amber were brought to Kaliningrad. They were processed. When he showed the samples Belarusian amber and Baltic, no one could distinguish - by chemical and physical properties they are absolutely the same.
And these are store shelves with jewelry. Kaliningrad amber is one of the top sellers here. They even buy it unprocessed - they say it helps with problems with the thyroid gland. The hardened resin of ancient pine needles is considered the “memory of the earth” and the best amulet.
Irina Shcherbinina, seller:
In addition, foreign tourists are interested in it. In particular, from the People's Republic of China. We hope that soon the products of Belarusian craftsmen will appear on the shelves of our store. And we will delight our customers with our products.
And it seems that it is just a matter of time. After all, the depths of our country still hold many unsolved secrets.
The Ministry of Natural Resources will draw up a geological map of Belarus
News of Belarus. A geological map of the country will be drawn up in Belarus. The Ministry of Natural Resources announced this on June 6, as reported in the “24 Hours” News program on STV.
We are talking about territories that may contain minerals. Now preparatory work is underway, as well as the search for funding.
The mapping program will begin in 2021. It is planned that this will be a breakthrough in geological exploration.
The department also noted the prospects of new ore and oil deposits. Investors are showing interest in their development. Thus, the bidding to find an investor to develop one of the oil fields was successfully completed.
Andrey Khudyk, minister natural resources and security environment Belarus:
The auction has just been completed. As of today, the results of the auction are being summed up. This is an oil field. To date, an investor has shown interest. We hope that he will actually sign the contract and develop it. But this is in the future.
Every year 1 million 700 thousand tons of oil are produced in Belarus. They plan to increase the figure in 2019.
The Belarusian sunstone is taken from a swamp near the village of Barantsy, Zhabinkovsky district, Brest region. Here is located one of the 22 deposits explored in past years at the Gatcha-Osovsky amber occurrence. According to geological exploration data, up to 2.5 tons of valuable fossilized resin rest in the pilot area where trial operation is being carried out.
From Barantsy to deposit No. 2 it is about 10 minutes off-road. The most difficult section is the last 500 meters to the swamp. Here you have to either walk or ride a decommissioned Gaz-66 firefighting vehicle. The workers say that the Niva can also pass, but this is not certain. Nearby is a narrow gauge railway Railway, which leads from nowhere to nowhere. It is here for the future: if “amber tramples.”
"Shishiga" stops near the guard's booth. There is a motor boat at the makeshift pier. A boat through the swamp delivers workers and geologists to the platform where trial mining of Belarusian sunstone is taking place. Previously, only black diggers worked here, now it is a contractor company.
The area of the deposit where trial production is being carried out is 19,800 square meters. m. In the pilot area of the Gatcha-Osovsky swamp massif, 22 deposits were identified and explored. According to the project, they contain 2.5 tons of amber. In the developed deposit No. 2, reserves amount to 345 kg.
— The depth of amber occurrence according to the project is up to four meters. According to the results of our geological exploration - up to six meters. The conditions are difficult - it is a swamp after all. The deposit is uneven, extremely inconsistent in strike and depth. There are empty spaces, and there are areas where there is a high concentration. This indicates that these are Quaternary deposits - amber came here with glaciers and settled in the swamps. This is an extremely complex field. The concentration of amber per ton of host rock fluctuates: here, for example, 100 grams of amber per ton, and after five meters there may already be 0 grams per ton, explains the director of Belgeopoisk LLC. Oleg Pivovarchyk.
The pump is Italian, the pontoons are military, the cabin is from a combine harvester
We get into the boat with representatives of the contractor company and go to the platform. Outwardly, it resembles a huge amphibious harvester, which is stuck in a swamp up to its cabin. In the front part there is a control panel for an Italian deep-well pump worth 50 thousand euros. At the back is a bucket for loosening peat.
— The installation was created on the basis of the Dragflow submersible pump, Italy. To separate the sand from the coarse fraction and sort the amber, nets were purchased. Power plant UES 2250 (combine harvester - TUT.BY) manufactured by Gomselmash. Pontoons are military. We had to put it all together ourselves and set it up to make it work,” recalls a representative of the contractor company Pavel Baltsevich.
The pump descends to a depth and sucks in the amber-bearing rock. Then the mass is fed through a slurry pipeline to a sieve with a four-millimeter gap.
- Everything that is less than four millimeters: sand, water - goes away. The rest ends up on a conveyor belt, where it is manually sorted. In this deposit, according to the design and estimate documentation, we must wash 56 thousand cubic meters of rock. The fraction of amber-bearing rock over 4 mm is approximately 20%. Geologists and workers sort through the peat and select amber. We tried many methods, but only this one allowed us to significantly increase productivity,” explained Oleg Anatolyevich.
Geologists at the deposits work on a rotational basis: every two weeks. At the end of the working day, they pick up the mined stones from the platform, take them to the guard trailer, where they place them in a transparent bag and seal them. Then they will be sent to specialists in Minsk for examination and evaluation.
— We take samples, record the depth of occurrence and in what rocks. Our geological information is then logged, documented and will be used in reserve approvals. “For now, we are carrying out trial exploitation of the deposit in order to assess the prospects for industrial extraction of amber,” said the senior geologist of Belgeopoisk LLC. Alexey Anisko.
“Our stone is very dense. Kaliningradsky - transparent"
Over the last eight days of work, we managed to collect 18 transparent bags with amber. The total weight of the extracted product is 13 kg. The largest fraction is 10 centimeters in the crossbar and approximately 100 grams of weight. As experts note, on the market such a copy can cost more than $1,000.
“We can say that we have made history.” The first amber was smaller, and then the fractions became larger,” said Alexey Anisko. — Our amber has a very diverse range of colors, unlike Kaliningrad amber. Theirs is mostly honey-colored, while ours ranges from honey to lemon, cherry, and pomegranate colors. The variety of shades and colors are highly valued in the jewelry industry.
To confirm the words of the senior geologist, the investor’s representative Vladimir Mayuk took the amber and illuminated it with a flashlight:
— Our stone is very dense. Kaliningradsky is transparent. We have no cracks, chips and are completely translucent. Look what color it is. We have a dark color, garnet, and even with white splashes. The stone has its own characteristics. It is more colorful - more suitable for jewelry.
In Belarus, amber deposits are not primary, but quaternary, emphasizes Alexey Anisko. The sun stone was brought to us by glaciers.
— Scientists are still arguing about where they came from: from the territory of modern Ukraine or the Kaliningrad region.
“We are developing an option for using Belarusian amber for the jewelry industry”
For now, the task of Belarusian specialists is to conduct test production and determine. How suitable are our locations for such work?
— In order to understand the feasibility of mining, it is necessary to conduct geological exploration to understand the extractability of amber from the rock and make an economic and geological assessment. Determine whether industrial mining or artisanal mining is needed - that is, to develop deposits in small areas. In addition, you need to understand what kind of amber we have in Belarus - what is its size, grade, structure,” said Oleg Pivovarchik.
All collected material will be transferred to experts for evaluation.
— The tasks of expanding such work can be carried out when the economic feasibility of production is determined. But even these samples already show that Belarus has valuable raw materials. Now we need to resolve issues of its quality, cost and sales. And also the problem of creating in the country unified system, which would allow these raw materials to be extracted and sold,” says the deputy general director of Belzarubezhtorg Andrey Kovkhuto.
Border everyday life
When I was driving along the Ukrainian Kyiv-Warsaw highway a few weeks ago, my attention was involuntarily drawn to the occasional small groups of young people dressed in camouflage who were closely watching the cars passing by.
At such a moment, in the head of every Belarusian resident of the border strip, memories arise related to rumors that were actively circulating at the beginning of 2014 about mass attacks on our fellow citizens in the adjacent Ukrainian territory. Moreover, each of us then had an acquaintance, whose acquaintance, in turn, necessarily turned out to be a victim of gangster lawlessness in Ukraine. To what extent these rumors corresponded to reality is not reliably clear, but, as they say, the sediment remained. And, naturally, feeling the gaze of a dozen stern guys on you, you involuntarily press the gas pedal to the floor, nervously recalculating in your head the distance to your native border.
Belarusians today do not represent any interest to Ukrainians other than commercial within the framework of restored cross-border trade. It is clear that criminal incidents are possible, and no one is immune from them. However, it would not occur to anyone in Ukraine today to organize systematic attacks on us. The forced “boycott” that our compatriots staged against Ukrainian small businesses, almost ceasing to visit border markets two years ago, cost the Ukrainian side too much. And no one would want this situation to happen again. The Ukrainian Polesie region is too poor to create additional economic difficulties for itself, pushing away Belarusian buyers.
At the same time, the far from simple economic situation that has developed over the years has led to the formation of a completely special type of economic relations here. They are largely of a criminal nature, which, on the one hand, sets everyone against everyone, but at the same time ties them up and makes them accomplices. And the people we meet in uniform with or without insignia, who have become part of Everyday life warring Ukraine, organically fit into this economic system. Winter has ended in Ukrainian Polesie. Which means soon new strength Illegal logging and illegal amber mining and their further smuggling to the West will flourish. That is, those areas on which a significant part of our southern neighbors live will gain new momentum. And these people along the roads are only elements that ensure the functioning of this global mechanism.
We, the Belarusian residents of the border region, already those who are over 30, are very familiar with what smuggling is, especially the small household smuggling of alcohol and cigarettes, which was the trade of many Brest residents in the first two decades of Belarusian independence. We will not take here more complex schemes involving the transportation of goods and food products to the Republic of Belarus. This is all clear to us, and all this exists in the same Volyn region on the border with Poland. To one degree or another, we understand the machinations of deforestation. From time to time, authorities report identified facts of violation of the law in this area. But mass mining of amber in a region as far from the sea as Polesie looks somewhat exotic for Belarusians. And even more so on the scale that this phenomenon has acquired in areas south of Pripyat.
Polesie amber. Excursion
It cannot be said that the topic of amber is completely unknown to the Brest reader. From time to time, reports appear in the press that further deposits of this stone have been found in the region. It is well known that amber deposits are located along the conventional line Pruzhany - Ivanovo - Motol - Stolin - Mikashevichi - Zhitkovichi - Lelchitsy. And most of them are concentrated in the Brest region. Further, this arc goes in the west to the territory of Poland, where the largest Polish amber deposits are located in the vicinity of Lublin, in the southeast it passes into the system of amber deposits of Ukraine, which stretch from the Carpathian region through Ukrainian Polesie, the Kiev region to the middle reaches of the Dnieper.
At the same time, neither during the Soviet period, nor during the years of independence, the issue of industrial mining of “sun stone” was seriously raised in our republic. This is understandable. The USSR had the world's largest Baltic mines, and developing new ones was a troublesome business. And there were extractive industries that were more profitable. For the Republic of Belarus, in the rich years of oil and gas abundance, the state was not interested in delving into a completely new area, the profitability of which was difficult to calculate. Here, even with those that seemed familiar, things didn’t always work out well. The story with potash exports alone was worth it. Today, in times of crisis, the state naturally does not have money for various experiments. Well, in our country, at least, it is not customary to hand over issues related to subsoil use, and even more so to mining, to private owners. But, as you know, a holy place is never empty. It is obvious that the amber fishery has its own profitability, and if legal counterparties are not interested in it for various reasons, then this leads to accelerated criminalization of the sphere. Largely only due to the lack of any regulatory policy. And it is obvious that amber mining may soon become a social, economic and environmental ulcer for Brest Polesie if the state does not take appropriate measures for this in time, and not only of a prohibitive nature.
Not because of a good life, but our compatriots are increasingly looking for income by moving away from prying eyes and organizing illegal “digging” of amber. At the end of 2015, Brest media already reported that facts of this kind were noted in Kobrinsky, Zhabinkovsky, Berezovsky, Drogichinsky districts of the region. Almost certainly, the transfer of work experience and technology in this profile occurred from the territory of Ukraine.
The territory covered by this fishery in Ukraine can be represented by drawing a quadrangle on the map with the following sides: Belarusian-Ukrainian border (North) - highway E-373 (Kiev-Korosten-Sarny-Kovel) (South); city of Kamen-Kashirsky (West); city of Ovruch (East). For the convenience of our readers, we will explain that the western and eastern borders approximately coincide with the Belarusian cities of Drogichin (Brest region) and Lelchitsy (Gomel region).
Harsh everyday life of amber fishing
At the moment, the main concentration of illegal mines is concentrated in the north of the Zhitomir, Rivne and Volyn regions. At the same time, the Volyn region was the last to be exposed to this social ulcer, and largely not of its own free will. The fact is that for a relatively long time the work of a prospector in Volyn was not considered prestigious. The region was more prosperous compared to its neighbors. Most likely, this was largely influenced by its border location with Poland and, as a consequence, the presence of greater business opportunities. Including illegal ones. Those who did not find themselves in commerce could always go to felling wood. In general, it’s also not always legal. However, in the post-revolutionary period, the Volyn region was finally drawn into the amber trade. This was largely facilitated by the massive appearance in the region of prospectors from other regions, where, for various reasons, mining opportunities for them were limited.
The Rivne region has traditionally been considered the center of amber mining in Ukraine. Also, large deposits were discovered in the western regions of the Zhytomyr region. On the basis of these regions, in the mid-nineties, the state enterprise Ukrburshtyn was created in Ukraine, which was supposed to engage in industrial extraction of amber. By various reasons The enterprise never came into full operation and, after several reorganizations, found itself in a reorganization procedure for many years, with difficulty making ends meet. As the reorganization dragged on, the volume of the illegal amber market in Ukraine grew. While in the Stolin and Luninetsky regions Belarusian poleshuks were burying themselves in beds for cucumbers and strawberries, their relatives on the other side of Pripyat were increasingly burying themselves in “digs” in search of amber. The size of the population that is involved in this process, today not a single expert undertakes to outline. Everyone unanimously claims that entire villages go to fishing. One way or another, a significant part of the population of the entire region is tied to it. There is a consensus that estimates of tens of thousands of people no longer reflect the real state of affairs. It is worth noting that in this case we are talking not only about the miners themselves. A whole infrastructure of related “industries” has grown up around the industry - the sale and repair of motor pumps for mining, equipment for stone processing, stone processing workshops, providing miners with food, a purchasing system, etc.
Like many others, social problems, tied to the extraction of amber, have been accumulating in Ukraine for decades. Sooner or later this boil had to burst. Under Yanukovych, the illegal mining market was redistributed according to clear bandit rules, and the local population was afraid of violating unspoken agreements, silently paying tribute either to crime or to the security forces. At the same time, often no one made much difference between one and the other. After the Maidan, significant changes occurred in the control system. In almost 2014-2015, information from the mine areas resembled reports from combat areas. At first it was something completely unusual, reminiscent of the revolutionary romanticism of Soviet cinema.
Perhaps the most famous case of this kind occurred in the vicinity of the village of Alekseevka, Sarnensky district, Rivne region. By the way, this is where some of the largest amber deposits are located. In the spring of 2014, a convoy of jeeps and trucks arrived in the village, in which, according to various sources, there were from 50 to 100 young people of athletic build. The “aliens” sternly explained that they would now be in charge of the mines. The “discussion” of the issue ended with the local male population coming from neighboring villages to the scene of the event. The conflict ended with the burning of a fleet of failed curators, 16 of them were taken to the police, 3 received gunshot wounds, two were stabbed, the rest fled. After this, local residents began to field their own armed self-defense units and control the mining territory themselves.
However, then the situation began to develop less romantically. But in general, I couldn’t do it any other way. The entire process of extraction and sale was illegal. Let's give some numbers. According to experts, the annual turnover of illegal trade can reach up to 300 million US dollars per year. Every year more and more people were involved in illegal fishing. Only according to the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in the Rivne region, the number of registered reports of illegal amber mining from 2010 to 2015. increased sixfold. In 2010, law enforcement agencies seized 4.61 kg of amber, in 2011 - 4.74 kg, in 2012 - 1.95 kg, in 2013 - 18.44 kg, and last year - 215.16 kg. Since the beginning of the year, 53 vehicles and 173 motor pumps have been seized, while in 2010 - 24 motor pumps, in 2011 - 44. The numbers reflect only the growth rate, but not the scope of the phenomenon.
The state could not help but intervene in this area. However, now the state’s attempts to restore order were met with stiff resistance from the miners. In the spring of 2015, in the same Rivne region, 200 amber diggers attacked a group of 40 people from the Ministry of Internal Affairs who were carrying out operational measures to suppress the illegal mining of “sun stone”. As a result, 7 police officers received varying degrees of injuries, their service weapons were taken away (then returned), as well as special equipment (they were not returned).
Let us remind you that trust in the law enforcement system in Ukraine remains at an extremely low level. Only in recent months has this attitude begun to change as a new patrol police began to operate in the country as part of the reform of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which we will try to tell you about in the following publications. In the meantime, the man in the prospector's uniform remains part of the general criminal system, with which he is forced to share his unstable income. Local miners have already taken root in a negative image of an employee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs: a policeman causes hatred not only because he participates in protecting criminal schemes, but also because at the end of the reporting period he strives to confiscate more amber, motor pumps and cars from ordinary miners in order to fulfill the plan. At the same time, appropriate part of the confiscated goods for yourself.
In addition to the lines of confrontation described above between miners and criminals, as well as miners and law enforcement agencies, there are other, perhaps more complex ones. social conflicts. As local residents, criminals, and the police took control of mining in some regions, pockets of confrontation over undivided territories began to flare up between miners from different regions. An example of this is a skirmish near the village of Sushchany, Zhitomir region, where local and visiting prospectors fought hand-to-hand. The number of participants on each side was about 300 people.
A more “fresh” example and geographically closer to the residents of Brest. Autumn 2015, outskirts of the village of Lesnoye, Manevichi district, Volyn region. A collision occurred near a checkpoint leading to one of the mines local residents and visiting diggers. The locals called the police. Despite the presence of law enforcement officers, the number of visitors was constantly growing, reaching, according to some estimates, 5,000 people. Mostly these were prospectors from the neighboring Rivne and Lviv regions. Here we will explain that after the redistribution of territories in neighboring regions, it was the Manevichi region of Volyn that became another amber “Klondike”, where the remaining out-of-work prospectors flocked. This mass of people managed to process about 7 hectares of land in a few hours of work. Meanwhile, the Ministry of Internal Affairs brought additional units from neighboring regions to the scene. As a result of the operation, about 200 people were detained.
At the same time, another vector of confrontation is unfolding. The lands where amber is mined are not owned. Unlike Belarus, a large number of land in Ukraine was actually distributed among former collective farmers who became farmers. And illegal amber mining is increasingly leaving the forests and spreading to agricultural lands. In the same Volyn region, in one of the villages of the Lyubeshovsky district, peasants were forced to organize local self-defense. The reason for this was the constant visits of diggers, which rendered the surrounding fields unusable.
Let us note that, regardless of the mining method, after illegal mining the landscape is an absolutely dull and even frightening sight. If, for “research” purposes, an area can be dug up using shovels with several dozen 2x2x2 meter holes, which after this, although not suitable for agricultural use, can be reclaimed, then after “pump” mining there is nothing left alive. A plot of land selected for mining can be cleared of forest using special equipment or burned, a deep-sea ditch can be dug, water pumps can be connected using fire hoses, and then the soil can be washed out to a depth of 20 m. The amber washed out in this case is caught using fishing nets. No one has yet attempted to calculate the number of lands destroyed in this way. But, in all likelihood, the count is already running into thousands of hectares. No one knows what environmental consequences amber fever will have for regions that once experienced large-scale land reclamation. Let’s just say that this phenomenon does not bypass either game reserves or National parks. Therefore, there is no doubt that there will be consequences.
Price issue
Winter in Polesie has not been long for a long time. The reports of the SBU and the Ministry of Internal Affairs were full of reports of new arrests as soon as the snow melted. Given the ever-increasing activity of law enforcement agencies, diggers began to go to work at night and work by headlights. Despite the fact that almost all security forces are involved in the fight against illegal mining, except, perhaps, the armed forces, significant results in this fight have not been achieved. People are not afraid of fines or even possible imprisonment. The fine is compensated by income; the courts, in turn, practically do not make harsh rulings in cases of this kind. Nobody wants to disturb the already fragile peace in the region, where amber mining has really breathed life into entire settlements. No matter how we feel about this phenomenon, it has given guaranteed income to a huge mass of people. For example, as of the end of 2015, the price is 1 kg. amber stones up to 2 gr. was about 30 US dollars. A kilo of stones, 10-20 grams each. – 2,200 US dollars. Large fractions weighing 50-100 g. were estimated at 5,200 US dollars per kg. Large stones over 200 grams could cost up to $10,000. The prices given are approximate and could vary depending on the area and mining conditions.
Amber fever had its share of external factors. And the main one is China, or rather, the Chinese people’s craving for luxury goods that has arisen against the backdrop of many years of economic growth. People who have been following the precious metals market are aware that last years One of the main items of Chinese imports was precisely precious stones, precious metals and other products from the so-called luxury segment. It turned out that amber, due to the Chinese national traditions It is especially valued in the Middle Kingdom, and products made from it are in unprecedented demand.
Experts on the issue argue that Poland also played a major mediating role for the amber fever in Polesie. Our enterprising western neighbors quickly established supplies of Ukrainian amber to world markets under the guise of Polish amber. Polish amber has long been traded on the world market; its origin does not raise suspicions. Poland retains about 70% of the world market for amber products. And almost certainly these positions are secured largely thanks to Ukrainian raw materials. In Gdansk, at the world's largest amber exchange, the price of stones is already several times higher than that at which purchases were made from miners in Ukraine. The Chinese were also actively buying amber, directly coming to the mining areas, to the same Sarny, where, according to rumors, they rented almost entire hotels.
Time will tell how the slowdown in Chinese growth will in turn affect the amber rush in Polesie. So far, world economic statistics say that the traditional world leaders in jewelry production, such as South Africa and other countries, which have consistently supplied Beijing with diamonds and other expensive household items that please the pride of ordinary millionaires, have already suffered from the economic downturn in China.
Epilogue
The local population is little concerned about these subtleties of global economic processes. Amber breathed a second life into the region. The fleet of vehicles began to change, construction began to resume, and new luxury cottages began to appear. According to rumors, an ordinary miner can earn up to 50 thousand dollars a year. No one openly confirms or denies these figures. Poleshuks are generally not very talkative people. They silently go into the forest to do their hard work and day after day they turn over rock with shovels, some knee-deep, and some head-first in clay slime. Some don't come back. Some from the collapse of the “dig”, some from the hands of competitors. Nobody keeps statistics on deaths at the mines. In war it’s like in war.
Polesie is a sad region, a region with a complex history. Anyone who has studied the Second World War remembers that here everyone fought against everyone, and the joke that my grandfather’s “Schmeiser” is buried in the forest does not sound like a joke here. That’s why no one wants to strike a match here and start putting things in order with an iron fist, even if they wanted to. Because now it will be very difficult to take away from the population not so much their income, but their dream, by covering up the illegal circulation of amber. The authorities understand that they can go into the forests, like their great-grandfathers 70 years ago. Just not with shovels anymore. And many will leave. Therefore for a long time our neighbors will have a state of general confrontation incomprehensible to the common Belarusian, which will never develop into civil war, and will remain a mild form of Makhnovshchina, which allows to the common man live outside the state.
Well, we, Belarusians, if anything happens, we need to calmly drive past groups of people in camouflage and not ask them unnecessary questions. People in camouflage - that’s just how they are, they don’t like unnecessary questions in any country.
Vladimir VOLYNSKY
